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Friday, 26 April 2013

Dublin Bay Godwit drops by Scotland

A flock of Black-tailed Godwits, that spent the winter 2012/13 near NorthBullIsland in DublinBay, included a very special
bird. Photographed at least three times
by Cian Merne, Richard Nairn and John Fox, it had a selection of colour rings
on its legs. It turned out that this
bird had been marked by a Scottish ringer, Raymond Duncan, at the MontroseBasin,
between Dundee and Aberdeen on the north-east
coast of Scotland. It had been caught as a juvenile, only a few months
old, on 16th September 2012, not long after it had left its breeding
grounds in Iceland. With its new colour combination of orange and
blue rings, EX71920 flew south to DublinBay where it was first resighted in
December by Christer Persson at the SantryRiver. A day later it was seen in Lein Park Raheny
before moving with the flock to feed near the Bull Wall until at least March. By May 2013, it would be back in Iceland after a flight of at least 1,500 kilometres, which it could have
undertaken in one day. We will be looking out for this bird again
next winter in DublinBay.

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